Thoughts, feelings, and actions yet to come have all been locked within the ancient tomb of my mind. My body so old now, my heart has become so weak that I lay unable to open my eyes. Though I cannot see, I still can hear the familiar sounds of a place I will always dread. Listening intently I hear the persistent beeping coming from various monitors hooked up to my body, and in between, the constant shuffle of doctors and nurses hurrying from one room to the next. Still unable to look around me, I am content to picture in my mind the stark whiteness of my room. The white walls, crisp white sheets, and bright lights shining down on me. Then I imagine, like the many times in my past, my lover standing ever so near to me, though I know with a pain enveloping my heart, that he will not be my last sight before I die.

Now my mind has run away with me, carrying me helpless towards the memories I have tried so long to bury and forget. But it should be only fitting that my last thoughts are of the one that I will always love more than life itself. The bright white image inside my head begins to fade, drifting away from me like the soft, gentle mists bordering a lake I remember as a child. In their place is another type of white, but this does not have the calmness of the mist, nor the brightness of my room. No this white brings coldness, fear, sorrow and death.

***********

The heavy snow continued to fall upon us, contrasting so severely to our black attire that it was a miracle we were not spotted laying in the cold, deep bank of snow. I held my sniper rifle out in front of me, flakes falling onto my body and the lifeless extension of myself as I waited to hear the order given to me from a man who could heat my body with only a glance, even in this cold.

Twenty feet away, in a similar position as I was, Michael lay in silent contemplation. I knew he must be cold--since I was freezing--but he would never admit it. Michael would lie here, in the snow, watching and waiting for the latest terrorist scum to walk out of what they pitifully called a hide out, probably until hell froze over. Or perhaps this was hell? Stranded in the middle of nowhere, our transportation unable to make a pick up in the whether conditions, and Operations making the most of our cold situation by forcing Michael's team to walk two miles in the snow and take care of a new terrorist. I would have said that our situation couldn't get any worse, but living in Section you learn that anything can turn from bad to lethal, and it would take only seconds. At that moment, I never knew how close I was to the truth.

A momentary shiver coursed throughout my body as I fought to keep my teeth from chattering. I could hear a few operatives over our com links had already given up that battle and were doing so as silently as they could. Then suddenly everything stilled. Eight pair of eyes from different positions around the compound focused on the cabin door being pushed open. I peered through the crosshairs of my rifle, sighting the door as it made a slow, silent arc, and waited for Betrosky, our terrorist, to appear.

"Nikita, be ready." His voice was silky smooth and warmed me to the core. With only a few words, Michael demanded all my focus and attention, not only for the mission, but to awaken the burning hunger within us both. Our plan had been to spend the evening together after the first mission but that had been delayed. I let a smile filter across my face as I saw Betrosky walk through the door, thinking that perhaps it wasn't too late for us to be together tonight.

My finger tightening on the trigger, time seemed to stand still. The snow still fell heavily, making it hard to see the terrorists walking through the snow, but somehow I saw Betrosky and took the shot. That was our mission, kill Betrosky and the rest would scatter, and scatter they did but not for the reasons Operations was thinking.

As soon as my shot rang out, echoing in the white-coated valley, an ambush followed. Gunfire shattered nature's tranquility with the force of a hurricane. Quick and brutal they came with no time to think of whom they were, only of the death that followed in their wake. Over the com unit, I heard Michael's voice yelling for the team to take cover, to abort, and then I heard my teammates fall one by one. In seconds, half Michael's team was dead or dying, and the rest of us were quickly fighting for our lives.

Somehow, Michael made his way to my side and together we fought. Covering each other's backs as we headed for the trees. Almost there, I felt hope surge up, my eyes locking with Michael's, and then that hope was destroyed. Ripped away from me with the very bullet that tore through my leg and then a second, which hit my side.

As I fell, I grabbed for my leg before the second bullet hit and I suppose that was all Michael saw. In the confusion, he only knew that I was hit once, and never one to give up, Michael haules me to my feet and forces me towards the trees. With his arm around me, we both stumble through the snow covered foliage and I feel the stickiness of blood, thinking wrongly that it is only my own.

Blackness blurs my vision, yet still we pushed on, knowing that to live would be only a matter of how much distance was put between us and the unknown terrorist group that killed our team. I fell in the snow more than once, cold and tired, but always Michael was there, pushing me forward, his love giving me strength to continue until I could continue no longer. The blackness took hold of me and I fell, unconscious to the ground in the center of a snow-coated plain, with my last coherent thought centering on the shock of Michael whispering his love for me.

I slowly came to hours later, in the same spot where I had fallen, only now I felt pressure against my leg and side and looked down to see that they had been bandaged by strips of cloth. In a hoarse voice, I attempted to whisper Michael's name. "Mi ... Michael?" Then, as I turned my head to search for Michael, fear gripped me with a force I had never felt before. There, face down in the snow where he had collapsed after tending to me was Michael.

His blood surrounded his body in a pinkish red mixture of snow and liquid grown cold.

Through my pain, I dragged myself on hands and knees to Michael's head, turning him over and feeling for a pulse. The only thing that greeted me was the ice-cold stare of Michael's beautiful lifeless green eyes that had died looking upon my unconscious form. Beginning to rock back and forth, my face crumpled in an expression of all consuming grief as the tears poured from my blue eyes and the sound of my anguish finally made it to my throat. In one long scream, I expelled all of my anguish and pain, not even hearing the sound of an incoming Section helicopter.

And with that scream, I opened my eyes to the present.

*************

Sitting beside me, soon to be the last living member of a group of people who made life worth living so long ago, Birkoff watches me with old, soulful brown eyes. His hair is pure gray, much like my own, and now looks older than I have ever seen him.

After Michael had died, Birkoff and Walter kept me alive. If not for them I would have given up my soul and most likely my life, but they never stopped hoping, never stopped pushing me forward until finally I learned how to live again. Walter only lived long enough to see me put in Operations spot, to rule Section One and make it better under my influence. I didn't want the position. It should have been Michael's had he lived but I finally relented and after becoming head of Section, Walter passed away, his hand held gently in mine, much like Birkoff was doing for me now.

The pain in my heart for those who had left me and for those I must leave behind was only a dull ache now. Tightening my hand around Birkoff's, I hope he will understand that my death is not such a bad thing but more like a welcomed friend. I've lived a long and full life, full of wonderful friends and a love that has shaped my whole life into something so meaningful. What more could a person want?

Now my breath is coming in gasps, far and few between, my heart slowing down, my time coming near. A few stray tears trickle down from Birkoff's eyes, as he knows this is the end. We are the last of an elite group, a group that will be remembered throughout Section long after I am gone. Now Birkoff will be the last, left to carry alone the memory of our friendship until his time has come to join us. Then, as my heart stops, I pray my lover will hear my thoughts.

'I'm coming Michael. I'm coming to be with you my love'

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